


Winner Takes It All

by JokerGothNerd



Series: Celebrating The Holidays [8]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Betting, Castiel Is So Done, F/F, Hallowe'en, Halloween, Happy Ending, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, Mechanic Dean, Pumpkins, Spiders, Teacher Castiel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-31
Updated: 2017-10-31
Packaged: 2019-01-26 19:08:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,492
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12564216
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JokerGothNerd/pseuds/JokerGothNerd
Summary: Cas and Dean have a bet on whose yard is best decorated for Hallowe'en, loser is the other's 'Servant for a day’.Sorry, I'm not fantastic at summaries.





	Winner Takes It All

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Ldrmaslaz248](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ldrmaslaz248/gifts).



It was October 1st.

Which could only mean one thing - Castiel was out buying decorations for his front yard, as last year’s bunch were out of date, faded or the damp had got to them. Either way, he needed new ones.

His older brother, Gabriel, owned the store, so told him in passing conversation that they’d had their decorations delivered earlier that week. The shelves were still full, apart from the odd small gap, and it varied from lights to put over your house to models of monsters in many different sizes. Everyone in the neighborhood knew that Cas always put on a good show, since he moved there five years ago. His semi-detached house was a very common stop for children trick-or-treating, it was never too scary, and never too dull for the older ones.

It was widely speculated, unknown to Castiel, why he did it every year. It wasn’t as though he had a family of his own, he lived by himself, he didn’t even have any close friends in the neighborhood with children up until recently.

What they didn’t know was, Cas never had a particularly fun childhood - his very Christian parents didn’t want to celebrate a Pagan festival, hell, they weren’t very fond of homosexuals too. Which was why a now 23 year old Castiel Novak moved out as soon as he hit 18. So did Lucifer and Gabriel: for the same reason. Both lived relatively close, visiting him every so often. But back to our story…

As he was deciding which LEDs to buy, he heard a voice ask, “Cas?”

Castiel turned and nearly jumped, as Dean Winchester stood but a few meters away, smiling at him.

In February that year, Dean had moved into the house attached to Cas’, and unfortunately, Dean was extremely, incredibly attractive. And sweet. And Cas’ age. And single. And pansexual. And he had a great job. Could it get any better? The answer is no. Cas had checked. Even Lucifer’s boyfriend wasn’t all that, i.e. the longer hair wasn’t Cas’ style, but he was still a nice enough person.

“H-hello Dean, what are you doing here?” Cas stumbled on his words, mentally hitting himself for that trip up. ‘What are you doing here?’ of all the questions he could of asked. Dean was shopping, not practicing ballet.

“I’m just picking up Hallowe’en decorations for my yard, my brother told me they’d got the delivery not too long ago. I always go really over the top with it, but kids love it. You?” Dean just rolled it off his tongue like he’d been preparing for this moment, unlike his neighbor.

“Er, yeah, me too. I love having the time to decorate my garden, I’ve done it every year since I moved here five years back. It’s argued I have the best garden in the neighborhood,” Castiel had gained a little bit of courage by the end, bragging about how people liked it so much. It was the only thing he really had to be proud of. That and that he taught for a living, and his pupils ended up great.

“You trying to turn this into a competition Cas?” Dean laughed, as the only employee in at that moment, Charlie, turned the corner to see them both.

“‘Sup bitches. Talking about anything interesting that I may care about?” Charlie casually inquired standing a few feet away, messing with the wedding ring on her hand, “I saw on the cameras and thought I’d come chat. The place is dead.”

“Hello Charlie, how’s Jo doing?” Cas politely interrogated about her wife. Jo gave birth to their daughter, Laurie, the weekend before. If you’re wondering why their daughter didn’t get named after a comic book character, that’s because she was. Jo had agreed on one that wasn’t too obvious, and Charlie loved Watchmen. In Watchmen, Laurie Jupiter was a superhero. Look it up.

“Jo’s fine, tired mostly. Laurie’s been quite good though, and she sleeps through the whole night. Anyway, come on, what you two on about,” Charlie pleaded with her puppy eyes.

“Cas was telling me about his yard at Hallowe’en and-”

“Oh my god, yes! You’ve never seen it, it’s so amazing. You should take notes on him, Deano. Really, you should. Continue,” she gestured.

“... Well, anyway, I always make an effort with it too. I was just joking that it sounds like he was trying to get a competition out of it, that’s all,” Dean explained before being interrupted again.

“Why don’t you? Have a bet, see who has the best garden, get people to vote on it. Winner does the whole ‘servant for a day’ thing?” the redhead suggested, before her and Dean turned to Castiel, who hadn’t really spoken very much.

“Oh, it’s on.”

* * *

Shit.

It was only when Castiel had come home from work that he noticed it. Dean had begun decorating already, a week after they formed a bet.

And why was that a problem?

Because Cas had the metaphorical memory of a goldfish (p.s. they don't actually have 3 second memories, sorry to ruin your dreams) which meant he had completely forgotten about the bet. He was going to lose badly at this point.

“Heya Cas! Like what you see?” Dean smirked, “You know, if you give up now, I'll take that as a victory and there's no need to fight over it.”

Cas stood squinting at Dean, almost grinning at the thought he might back down. So ridiculous. As though Cas was going to lose. Not a chance. This was war.

“Oh Dean, I'm just getting started. Ciao,” he snapped his head back to the house and smugly waltzed inside.

The second that door shut, he was leaning against it wondering where this new side of him had come from. Castiel knew this bet was bringing out a new side of him, a sarcastic, badass side. And he wasn't going to stop it.

This encounter had reminded him to begin planning out what he was doing with those LEDs exactly. And, Cas was halfway through making a giant spider from cardboard and plastic cups. He was going to cover the whole garden with fake webs, placing the creature in a dark corner.

Cas hadn't bought any pumpkins yet, in the fear that they could go mouldy by the 31st, however he was going to buy ten small ones that would be carved into different faces, then placed on separate plinths. There was a lot more, but it had only been fully decided on the garden so far.

He just hoped this whole competition didn't ruin anything between them.

* * *

October 30th. He couldn't believe this. One day until he lost it all. Or at least at this rate he would. Here's the rundown of October 9th - 30th.

Castiel finished making the spider; he put it outside; he was at work the next day when it rained heavily, destroying all his hard work; he made another spider; it hadn't rained since; he'd put a few gravestones up with skeleton hands coming up from the ground; the store had run out of pumpkins and didn't get a delivery until the 29th; Castiel was now frantically trying to carve 10 small pumpkins before Lucifer and his boyfriend came over for the afternoon.

And on top of all this, Dean had been destroying his prized carnations by putting weed killer over them. This may not have ruined his Hallowe’en set, but it really pissed Cas off.

Everyone now knew about the bet they had, Charlie had announced it at some point apparently. Or word had gotten around, no one really knew. So in between work, Castiel had just about managed to pull off a reasonable garden, and complained repeatedly to Lucifer and Gabriel about his neighbor.

Cas really didn't want to fight Dean, he wanted to fuck him. But that really wasn't going to happen the way things were going lately. It had gotten really aggressive and vicious.

He needed to get his own back on Dean, and he was going to get that sooner than planned.

* * *

There was a knock at the door bang on 1pm, and Cas had forgotten Lucifer and co were coming up, so instead he shouted, opening the door, “For fucks sake Dean, if you've- oh. Sorry,” he was instead greeted with older brother Lucifer and Lucifer’s boyfriend, Sam.

“Heya baby bro, how you doing? And who's Dean?” Lucifer asked, walking into the house to take off his shoes.

“It's my neighbor I've been telling you about. I don't know why, but I thought it was him, not you. How are you Sam?” Castiel greeted.

“I'm fine, thanks. You know, I had an older brother called Dean. But I ran away from home and don't know what happened to him. He'd be the type to start a war over Hallowe’en though,” Sam laughed, ducking under the doorways slightly, before noticing that both Cas and Lucifer were staring at him, “What?”

“Sam, I never asked, but what's your surname?” Cas swallowed the lump in his throat. He didn't even know why he was nervous.

“Winchester. Sam Winchester, why?”

“Because Dean Winchester is my next door neighbor whom I've been having a feud over the yard with.”

Sam looked like he was going to throw up. But it was Lucifer that interrupted, “Wait, that's Dean Winchester? I know the dude, he hates me… hey Cas? Want to get him back for killing those flowers?”

* * *

Cas, in this moment of bliss, didn't stomp up the path to Dean’s house like he usually would. No, he savoured every little step, knowing just how pissed off he was going to be. It would be glorious. Lucifer was still sniggering, and Sam… Sam no longer looked nauseous, instead nervous, but eager to meet his brother after all these years. Cas had only rang the doorbell a few seconds before he heard it being unlocked and opened, “Hey Cas… What. On. Earth? Sammy?”

The younger Winchester ran up to Dean, holding him in a manly embrace as tears ran down his face. Castiel would have normally thought it was sweet, then again, he wanted to get to the good part.

“Sam, why are you here? How did you find me?” Dean bombarded him with questions, and Sam answered all too quickly.

“I live not too far from here, actually. I'm a friend of Castiel’s. Because, I'm kind of… dating his brother… Lucifer Novak,” Sam gestured to the blond man stood next to Cas, who had the most sadistic grin on his face Dean had ever seen.

“Lucifer? You're going out… with Lucifer?” no one spoke up, “Come on man! Really?! Him of all people. You know what, fine. I can deal with this. It's cool. Just don't let him come anywhere near me.”

Castiel and Lucifer couldn't contain the laughter much longer, nearly falling to the ground manically cackling. It took a few minutes for them to stop and regain their breath, when they did, Cas spoke, “Sam, I'd like to point out, Dean isn't homophobic, he just doesn't like Lucifer. No, because Dean is pansexual. Bye Dean, talk later.”

He carefully, so not to start skipping, sauntered home, leaving Sam and Lucifer to catch up with Dean. Revenge did feel good actually, for about ten minutes, and then he felt remorse. Cas shouldn't have done that. It would only lead to fighting tomorrow.

Fuck.

* * *

Hallowe’en had arrived.

Cas didn't have to stand outside and look at his house to know he'd done his best, and boy, did it look good. However, Dean was stood not too far away, looking at his own. In truth, they were comparing to see who'd probably won the bet. Charlie came round earlier with Jo and Laurie to tell them that she was going to count up votes for the bet, and she'd be back later.

Cas hadn't taken a good look at Dean's house until now - he'd been too focused on his own. He knew that if they combined forces, they'd have the best yard in the neighborhood, perhaps even the state.

The corners of each window, the doorway and coming from under the roof was fake (or maybe it was just laziness) cobwebs, full of dead 'flies’ (Cas was pretty sure they were raisins). On one side of the lawn was a body bag, a bloody arm sticking out the side. There were stray body parts strewn across the rest of the grass, blood leading up the path. And that was only half of it. It looked good. And so did it's proprietor.

“You know, Cas, I can't wait for tomorrow, the whole house needs cleaning, I want a three course meal-” Dean began to run through this obscene list.

“Oh, fuck off. I've given up with this stupid bet anyway. Your house is better, happy? Because I've just ruined my life for this. Do you know how many meals I've missed? How much sleep I haven't got? How this was my chance at one good thing? I'm done with this. I don't want to fight anymore. You win. Congratulations,” but as Cas turned to walk off in a strop, Dean snatched up his wrist.

“Cas wait, please. I didn't know it had been destroying you inside. Look, I'm not going to be too hard on you. Okay?” he agreed. Castiel nodded in return, however he still ventured towards his house.

All the little trick-or-treaters had been and gone when Charlie, Jo and Laurie came knocking, gathering at the end of their drives to announce the winner.

“And the winner of the bet, the man who's getting a servant for a whole day is… Castiel Novak!” Charlie shouted, then whooped. Even Laurie gurgled a little bit.

“Seriously?!” Dean looked as though he may cry.

“Ha ha, well then Winchester, why don't we say the servant part starts now and ends tomorrow at nine thirty? It won't be as hard,” Cas laughed, the grin fixed on his face.

“Right bit- ladies. It's time for us to head home, call me,” Charlie took the pram from Jo, and her wife's arm, heading off and away from the cold.

“Dude, no. How? I thought I did such a good job of it. Sam even said it was better. Maybe he was just being nice. But I still don't know-” through all of Dean's babbling, he'd failed to realise exactly what Cas was doing: contemplating how to shut him up. Using his mouth. It took Dean a moment to figure out what was happening, then he joined in, and it got rougher and rougher every second, until Castiel broke it off, to smile and ask, “Victory sex?”

“Victory sex.”

And the rest was history.

But I think you should know that they were a force to be reckoned with when they knocked down the walls that separated their houses, and so they could live happily ever after.


End file.
